The honeymoon lovemaking we had enjoyed, if that word could possibly suffice to describe it, had been perfunctory at best, and had left me wondering why anyone would make such a fuss over the carnal act. I surmised that I had experienced so little of what I had supposed was passion because I did not love my husband. Perhaps things would improve with time.
The stated period of concealment of our marriage soon elapsed, and every day became a trial for me. Mr. Robinson and I had separate abodes, but we had shared a bed as man and wife during our honeymoon at Maidenhead.
What if I should become pregnant, and all the sacrifices I had made to enjoy a modest and comfortable life turn to satire? Mr. Robinson, perpetually at chambers in Lincoln’s Inn, evinced no haste to remove the subterfuge. I began to suffer headaches as the days wore on, terrified that Mother and I had been sold a false bill of goods that could never by law be returned.
One blustery afternoon, Mr. Cox paid us a call. After handing his hat and cloak to a housemaid, the solicitor met us in the drawing room, his face a picture of concern.
“My investigations have yielded fruit,” he began, “but I fear the taste will be bitter.”
Mother began to grow agitated even before Mr. Cox unearthed his intelligence. I clasped my hands so tightly that my flesh began to turn even whiter.
“Where to begin,” sighed Mr. Cox. “First of all, Thomas Robinson has already attained his majority, and has been of age for some time. However, he has more than a few months of his clerkship remaining. I believe he represented to you both that he had but three months left to serve, and told you as much many weeks ago. In truth, with more than a year remaining, he is nowhere near the termination of his clerkship. The third, and grandest, lie I have caught him out in is that Thomas Harris of Tregunter House, Carmarthenshire, is not Mr. Robinson’s uncle. Mr. Harris is Mr. Robinson’s father.”
My hand flew to my breast. “A bastard,” I murmured.
“Precisely, I’m afraid.”
“Then who is Mr. Robinson’s mother? Is there a Mrs. Harris? Are there legitimate issue from the marriage?”
“I have not been able to ascertain the answer to your first question, Mrs. Darby,” said Mr. Cox. “Mr. Harris appears to be unmarried, and there are at least two other children of his—an older brother of Thomas’s, also going by the name of Robinson, and presently employed with the East India Company—and a sister, who resides with Mr. Harris.”
“If there is an elder brother…then how can our Mr. Robinson be the sole heir to Mr. Harris’s property?” my mother asked. She looked to Mr. Cox for an explanation but he had none at the ready. “It’s all my fault,” Mother said, her voice atremble, tears bathing her rosy cheeks. “I encouraged the match with every fiber of my being. I was blind to the signs. My poor little Mary.” I knelt at Mother’s feet and wept into her lap as I had done when I was but a little girl. “Then what are we to do, Sam?” she asked, looking almost as bereft as she had done when George was at death’s door with the pox.
“It is regrettable that you cannot back out of the thing,” said Mr. Cox.
I raised my head from Mother’s lap. “No. We cannot by law obtain an annulment, for we have lain together after the sacrament of marriage. What’s done cannot be undone. I vowed to be Mr. Robinson’s, and his I am, till death us do part, and I shall have to stand by him. Although,” I added, attempting to inject the somber moment with a feeble bit of levity, “I would have much preferred that marrying for richer or poorer most distinctly referred to the former option.”
At the solicitor’s suggestion, Mr. Robinson was requested to attend upon us on the following Tuesday evening.
“For the first time, I confess I now repent the influence I used in promoting your union,” Mother said to Mr. Robinson. “I apprehend some gross deception on your part, sir. You may be paying for our establishment in Great Queen Street, but that makes my daughter seem little more than a kept woman. She is your legal wife, sir, and I am firm in my resolution that I can no longer consent to this marriage remaining a secret.”
Mr. Robinson’s natural affability deserted him. He stammered and spluttered, attempting like a worm to wriggle off the piscator’s hook by convincing the fisherman that his part in the affair had been misunderstood.
But my mother was inexorable. When she threatened never more to allow him within fifty feet of me unless he settled things once and for all with Mr. Harris, with much trepidation my husband ultimately agreed. Yet though the truth was out, he stubbornly insisted on maintaining the fiction that the wealthy Welshman was his “uncle.”
Mr. Robinson set off first—“to pave the way,” he said. George would be left in the company of a neighbor; and Mother and I were to take an excursion to the countryside, stop in Bristol to call on old friends, and eventually meet him in Carmarthenshire. Before he departed, my husband gave me a few guineas for expenses, and bade me write, at his behest, to Mr. King, a well-known money broker in Goodman’s Fields, asking him for the finances to subsidize our journey.
Thus began a two-month correspondence with this young and ambitious Israelite that at the outset blossomed into a rather fruitful acquaintanceship. Mr. King was a fine-looking gentleman with none of the hallmarks that characterize the appearance of his tribe. His nose was aquiline, not hooked; his complexion more fair than swarthy; and his hair straight and fine, a rich shade of umber rather than a wiry ebony. Moreover, he was an intellect to be reckoned with, more learned than my husband in nearly every subject.
